I’d really love to have a chat with any of you about the relationship between truth and corruption. Someone seemed to say that we can dismiss religion because it’s corruptible; but wouldn’t that mean all institutions trying to honor truth are corruptible?

That said, I have a framing on how to define “truth” that I want to explore, if anyone is down. On your channel or mine. I’m small, haven’t used my channel in a long time

If you think of Truth as that which we *act* as though is true, and then it doesn’t contradict its premise, then free will is as true as we act as though it is true. And we all act as if it’s true; even Sam Harris prescribes this.

“What is Truth” is a crucial question and I do not think Harris answers it properly.

You meet because you act as though free will is true.
And, as far as you can tell it is, it IS true because acting as though it’s true doesn’t make it appear any less so.

The only thing that makes you think free will isn’t true is your thoughts, not your actions.

End ramble.

Also what book? 🙂 I’m new.

I was an atheist when I first read the Moral Landscape. I’d love to read it now as a Christian.

We’d make for a very interesting dialogue. I was raised Catholic, was an “anti-theist” for all of my 20s. Became Christian half way through age 31.

Could be fun to dig and ask questions of each other

For me I realized Christ long before I was willing to call it Christ. That’s very vague I know 😛 but at its core, I think it’s crucial that people know there is one objective truth, and the way to that truth is outside of our own logos. We’re limited; blind, relatively speaking.

Believing that the way to the truth is out there and it’s not ourselves is as important for us as it is a literally blind man being guided by his helper. That man exercises a ton of faith when listening to you (if you were his shepherd)

I’m too busy. Gotta bounce. I’d love to do this book club and jump on for chats later

Depends what you mean by “absolute morality”

I think it js clearly true that there are better ways to act than others, and that there is one exact way to act that is the most best way... but that we just don’t know what that is.

This is why Christians rely on letting the Holy Spirit move them and trusting that grace will fill in the mistakes.

It’s amazing how much we can mess up and things still be ok. Religious or not, that’s worth rejoicing over 😉

We all act as though Universal Truth is true.

Faith isn’t just a useful tool, it’s the mechanism which allows you to LIVE life without first having to justify it.

Science is a tool for understanding HOW things work, but can only capture the aspects of Truth that can be measured and used to control outcomes.

One’s need to control outcomes seems to correlate with their proclivity to only accept truths that Science can tackle, and deny truths that it cannot.

“Truth” is, in my approximation, “that which, when acted out, doesn’t contradict itself.”

Also, methods of getting to Truth are those which gives you real answers to defined questions.

Prayer is a way to Truth that cannot predict or control outcomes. It does, however, give you answers.

You can explain, mechanically, why it works, but you can’t deny that it works as it promises (which is without guarantee)

I have a LOT to say on this, but I’ll spare everyone for now. I just thought it would be nice to throw some of these ideas and thoughts into the mix, so that we might discuss Truth in a broader sense :)

(Lastly, Truth can be thought of “that which, if you deny, will make everything else false or ambiguous” ....)

@StoneCold316 what’s a VC? New here, sorry.

@Zurich04 I’m not sure my points are pragmatist, but I also don’t know much about the academic understanding of “pragmatism” so my idea of what that is might be WAY off. Happy to discuss (if that was directed at me)

@StoneCold316 happy to do a voice chat. When and where?

There’s no good reason we shouldn’t eat animals.
The people who believe that tend to think we are “of this world” in the same way that animals are, yet don’t get mad that many animals eat other animals.

I never enjoyed the vegan debate, and the people who tend to hold the vegan position often do it in a way that appears to me like they’re trying to find meaning in a world they otherwise argue is meaningless.

@kaizen what’s your world view by the way? One truth or many? Nihilist or no? Doing a survey 😛

Objective morals or no?

I would think any claim that veganism is “right” must not be paired with an idea of subjective or relative morality, nor can it be paired with nihilism or this idea that we are “merely animals”

Is there a proper channel to type in during the open mic?

Can someone link me the right text channel for open mic

Thanks! What the topic now

Lol centrism! Hmm ok 🙂

Centrism is a silly framing. I think it’s a way to remain ambiguous. Aaron Burr would be considered a centrist, and I don’t trust it; it’s not actually “center” it’s “slippery”

Also, the center tends to move in the direction of whichever tribe is winning. They have a foot in each, so it only makes sense

Anyone extreme could claim “centrism” as well.

For instance, if you believe in one god and one truth, you can claim “center” of something that might look like a horseshoe, where the godless are to the left and the false gods are on the right.

It’s a convenient term, like “balanced” “consent” and “cohesion”

@Yussuki ₪ I mean unanchored. Able to be swayed by the flaws of man

I would go a step further and say that hierarchy is ingrained in our biology like gravity is ingrained in our biology... it’s ingrained in our biology because it’s ingrained in our Universe.

We don’t “behave” like there’s hierarchy... our very existence is embedded in hierarchy

The mode of our existence is determined by hierarchy, it’s not like we “developed” it

Challenge for anyone here. Define: “is”

Because I believe the relationship between “is” and its definition ... is ... a way to start thinking about Truth, Knowledge and God.

@Malachi I really want to continue the conversation. How can we get in touch and talk maybe tomorrow or soon?

@StoneCold316 hey, yea I’d love to chat!

Here’s a topic for everyone: mental hospitals and other assisted living institutions.

If we actually sent mentally ill people into hospitals again, how different would society be? I have this theory that almost all Democrat policies make sense in mental hospitals and prisons, and that they treat the general public like a mental hospital or prison BECAUSE so many people who belong in them are not there. They’re free and have their terrible behaviors subsidized by the rest of us.

“No guns” “hate speech” “don’t trigger him” “socialized healthcare” “welfare” “inclusion” all that stuff makes sense at a mental hospital. perhaps people who tout this stuff should be the ones giving up freedoms for it, not the rest of us.

Mental hospitals are healthcare. Right now, the mentally ill get to run free, and the only cost to them is that they have to vote Democrat.

They get healthcare, paid for by the rest of us. And we get mentally ill people everywhere. Not a fair trade.

I’d happily pay double in taxes if the mentally ill had living situations where they had to give up something more than a vote.

Actually, they don’t “give up a vote” — that vote is bought, by Democrats, using your money.

P.S. welfare and healthcare are concepts that exist independent of government. If you removed government from the equation, you’d still have welfare and healthcare, it would just go into the private market.

People on welfare don’t like this because theyd rather be taken care of by a government where the only cost to them is a vote than by a community member, where the cost might be work, a curfew, or giving up ANYTHING “of value” for said welfare.

Government has become the ultimate pimp, taking care of more mother and children than any other entity in society. In almost all cases, government has more authority and power over families than the men of those families do.

We need to give that authority back to the men of society.

@Ozymandias literally untrue. We all have our struggles, but not all of us are a little crazy. And I shouldn’t have to argue that with you, but because my resources are redistributed to crazy people in ways I don’t consent, I feel obligated to waste my time making these arguments.

This system benefits the incompetent at the cost of the competent, and is exactly like a ship with many holes at the bottom.

@kcon415 something like that. Basically, if you need taxpayers to take care of you, you have to follow some of the taxpayer rules like stay in your facility, obey a curfew, etc.

There would be different levels of these institutions, and programs to help find you work.

The fact that one group of people can vote for government to take from another group of people to PAY FOR THEIR WELFARE, but then give up no freedoms of their own, shows we live in a slave society.

I just want Justice in the transaction

Please watch Stefan Molyneux’s presentation on the mental health crisis in America. It’s no coincidence that when mental hospitals went away, prison population went up.

Mental hospitals are way better than prisons for the mentally ill

That isn’t what I compared.

I simply said that “welfare” means something, and people choose to take it from government because the cost to THEM is cheap, but the cost to society is large. They trade a vote for a ton of resources.

The cost should be dialed up, and since they can’t afford it, they pay by following the rules of the taxpayers funding them. Assisted living for those who need welfare is reasonable and just.

If your next message still assumes I’m trolling, I’m writing you off as “dismissive” and we are not going to have this dialogue. Please engage in good faith.

More so, I’m saying the cost / benefit needs to be balanced.

We’ve gotten ourselves in a situation where the Feudal Lord Democrats steal from the Merchants and give to their Serfs.

The Serfs also function as a form of guerilla army of the Feudal Lords. When the Merchants threaten the relationship between the Lords and Serfs, they sic the serfs on them.

Don’t be confused; this is exactly what is happening across US cities for the last 100 days.

Merchants subsidize the bad behaviors and choices of the Serfs, and it’s done by force.

In a Democracy, all you need is more Serfs than Merchants, and the Feudal Lords win.

(This is why they want as many immigrants and people “in need” as possible)

If you want resources, you have to give something up. Parasites try to give up the least they can to get as many resources as they can. They sap the system of its resources and offer nothing to replenish it

Not sure what that has to do with my point.

Charity and caretaking is a wonderful aspect of humanity.

Theft and violence arent

Justice means, you take and you give.

The Democrats want to take without giving anything up

It is priceless, which is also why you can’t turn me into slave labor

If I grow 100 apple trees, I’d happily give 20 of them to my community.

If I grow 100 apple trees and 30 are stolen from me, however, we have a problem. At least, if you ARE going to take my apple trees, leave me something of value in its place.

Soldiers get a lot for their service. It’s a trade.

What do I get for funding “clean needles” in SF?

That’s unclear

That same money can be out toward an assisted living facility so that the mentally ill aren’t shooting up in the streets

Those mentally ill can give up a bit of freedom for that welfare

Which voice chat room

@Malachi the second amendment is a limitation on government and it’s because in Britain, the government took all the guns and controlled the people

@Captain_Rogers people who want to participate in reciprocal free society (like us) need to do more than just talk about it. We need to start enacting it and exercising ways of saying “no” that doesn’t take away from our productivity.

The Marxist ideology is terrible, and it also wastes a ton of society’s resources because as we debate it, we aren’t working.

This is what happens when some adults pretend the children have the authority over them and other adults.

Except these aren’t merely children. There’s a whole army of grown men that, if you tell them no, they’ll burn your cities down.

Atlas Shrugged is one approach, but impractical enough

Heh

I think it all boils down to the same few principles. And it’s the difference between parasitical and reciprocal expectations in society.

I do not expect to be a parasite. I expect to have to pay for every good and bad thing in my life

Drug use is certainly immoral. We don’t need to agree on that, but it’s funny how so many of us are forced to subsidize it

Why should I pay for other people’s drug use?

Sorry, I thought you were implying recreational* drug use.

The consequences of those choices shouldn’t be forcefully paid for by the productive people of society if the productive people of society have no say in the terms.

It is immoral. We don’t typically subsidize people’s gambling habits.

Lying is immoral. We penalize it; it’s called fraud.

What’s yours?

It’s immoral to murder. It’s moral to defend life. Sometimes attackers die when life is defended.

Yea so slippery people believe that for sure

But look, we can actually disagree on what’s moral and not if we don’t force other people to pay for the consequences of our own mistakes

Isn’t that lovely?

Come to the voice chat

We don’t force them to

They can if they want, and sometimes they’ll have to... we just don’t force them, especially in a way that relieves the mistake maker of all of the responsibility

Everyone wants total forgiveness

Imagine forcing me to pay for your murder

That would be nuts, but we do that all the time in smaller ways

I am forced to pay for people’s bad drug habits, bad sexual habits etc

Yes and at least a prisoner is also paying

I’m paying for their separation from society

They’re paying for their crime with imprisonment

My phone keeps overheating. Eye dr appointment now anyway

Black Lives Matter is about black lives mattering just like the Trojan Horse was just a gift

If I ever want to usher in Marxism, I’d call my group “Babies and love” so that way, when people criticize my movement I can be like “what? You don’t like babies and love?”

@Yussuki ₪ it is an indication of what we call a “low trust” society. Immigration, or social programs. Pick one; you can’t have both.

Immigration + social welfare incentivizes a parasitical society

Socialism is evil in that it believes the fruit of your labor can be forcefully taken and redistributed.

Babies are fruit of marriages, and don’t doubt for a minute that socialists believe they own that too.

In an individual sovereign worldview, the collective is that which manifests from the choices of free humans.

In a collective first worldview, a few people try to speak for the collective, or the terrible aspects of people try to vote for it.

Everyone here should read Animal Farm

Put equality of outcome at the top of your hierarchy and you will get it, but at the cost of everything else

@Yussuki ₪ I do not agree with that. America was unique in that we didn’t have to Feudal Lords for a long time. We had redundancy. Families, churches, communities, states.

Now we are becoming a Feudal system

The incompetent are incentivized to take from the competent, and if we don’t punish the theft, we deserve it

We didn’t always have slaves and not everyone had slaves. Our cities, for instance, were quite free

But yes, slavery is terrible. That said, many benefitted from the arrangement

If someone steals from you and your forgive them, it’s still theft. Forgiveness isn’t consent, it’s forgiveness

Christ forgives your sins, he doesn’t consent to them

Yes

I’m waiting for my eye dr lol

Yes

“Every society is led by an elite”

No. Unless you’re saying that competency is elite

America was that way. We lost it